WERDEN
589
WESDIN
formation. The abbey possessed such immense in-
fluence and position that at the time of the suppres-
sion under Henry VIII the Earl of Derby was the
abbot's seneschal. In the vast wave of iconoclasm
that swept over the oountry in that tjTant's reign the
cathedral was sacked by apostates who scattered St.
Werburgh's relics. Fragments of the shrine were
used as the base of an episcopal throne. Many of the
labels and figures had been mutilated, and while
restoring them the workman by mistake placed female
heads on male shoulders and vice versa. Only thirty
of the original figures remain, four having been lost.
Later all these fragments were removed to the we.«t
end of the south choir aisle, where they have been
placed nearly in the original position of the shrine, which
is 10 feet high. St. Werburgh's feast is celebrated on
3 February.
Acta SS., I Feb.; Br.iD8Haw. Metrical Hohj Lj/fe and Hislory of Saynt Werburge, etc., ed. Hawkins Cprintrd in facsimile for the Chetham Societ.v, 1S48); Butler. Lines of the Saints (Lon- don, 1S33): DuGDALE, Monasticon anglicanum (London, 1846); DuNBAB. Diet, of Saintly Women (London, 1905), s. v.; Hiatt, Chester. The Cathedral and See (London, 1898) ; Leland, Collec- tanea (London, 1770); Lewis, Topographical Diet, of England (London, 1831), s. v.; Nova legenda Angliee, ed. Horstman (Ox- ford, 1901): Spelman, Hist, and Fate of Sacrilege (London, 1895); Tanner, Notitia Monast. (London, 1744).
SisTEE Gertrude Casanova.
Werden (Werthina, Werda, Werdena), a sup- pressed Benedictine monastery near Essen in Rhenish Prussia, founded in 799 by St. Ludger, its first abbot, on the site of the present city of Werden. The little church which St. Ludger built here in honour of St. Stephen was completed in S04 and dedicated by St. Ludger liimself, who had meanwhile become Bishop of MUnster. Upon the death of St. Ludger, 26 March, 809, the abbacy of Werden went by inherit- ance first to his younger brother Hildigrini I (S09- 827), then successively to four of his nephews: Ger- fried (827-839), Thiadgrim (ruled less than a year), Altfried (839-848), Hildigrim II (849-887). Under Hildigrim I, also Bishop of Chdlons-sur-Marne, the new monastery of Helmstadt in the Diocese of Hal- berstadt was founded from Werden. It was ruled over by a provost, and remained a dependency of Werden till its secularization in 1803. Gerfried and Altfried were also bishops of Miinster. The latter is the author of the oldest life of St. Ludger (ActaSS., Ill, March, 641-6,50; P. L., XCIX, 76&-90). The Abbots Thiadgrim and Hildigrim II were bishops of Halberstadt. Under the latter, the abbey church, begun by St. Ludger, was completed in 87.5, and solemnly dedicated to Our Saviour by Archbishop Willibert of Cologne, to whose archdiocese the mon- astery of Werden belonged. Under Hildigrim II the monastery, which up to that time had been the prop- erty of the family of St. Ludger, obtained on 22 May, 877, the right of free abbatial election and immunity. Henceforth the abbots of Werden were imperial princes and had a seat in the imperial diets. In 1130 the monastery of Liesborn was recruited with monks from Werden, replacing the nuns who had given up the regular life. The abbey church of Werden, de- stroyed by fire in 12.56, was rebuilt in the late Roman- esque style (12.56-7.5). Thereafter the monastery began to decline to such an extent that under Abbot Conrad von Gleichen (14.54-74), a married lajTnan, the whole community consisted of but three, who had divided the possessions of the abbey among them- selves. After a complete reform, instituted in 1477, by Abbot Adam von Eschweiler of the Bursfeld Union (see Bcrsfeld, Abbey of), Werden continued in a flourishing condition until its secularization by the Pru.ssian Government in 1.S02. The church, which was restored in 18.52, contains the sarcophagus of St. Ludger. The monastery buildings are now used as a penitent i.ary. Two of the 74 abbots who niled over Werden, namely, Ludger, its founder, and Bardo, who died in 10.51 as Archbishop of Mainz, are hon-
oured as saints. Werden was one of the richest ab-
beys in Germany. Its jurisdiction extended over
about five square miles and it owned nearly all the
land and the villages within that territory, besides
some possessions beyond it.
Jacobs. Gesch. der Pfarreien im Gebiete des ehemaligen Stifles Werden (2 vols., Dusseldorf, 1893^); Idem, Werdener Annalen (Dusseldorf. 1896); Schunken, Gesch. der Rrirhsnhiri Werden
(Neuss, 1865): Effmann, Die karnlingisch-nll I. /,',,,■,„ zu
Werden (Slrasshurg, 1899); Kotzsc-hkf, !)>■ ! Stadt
WVrrfm (Bonn. 1906); Bendel, Die rtf^-rrn (,; . . :< ufsch. Herrscher far die ehemalige Bcnediktineruhtei It --. i- u iu . . ; Ruhr (Bonn, 1908). Since 1891 the Werdener Hist. Vircin ia issiung Beitrage zur Gesch. des Stifles Werden (Bonn, 1909). fasc. 13 the same society is preparing a complete roll-book of the Stifl Werden.
Michael Ott.
Werner, Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias, coftvert, poet, and pulpit orator, b. at Konigsberg, Prussia, 18 November, 1768; d. at Vienna, 17 February, 1823. When sixteen years old he attended lectures on law and political economy at the University of Konigs- berg, and at the same time was a zealous disciple of Kant. He received an appointment as clerk in the War Office, which post he retained for twelve years, residing at Konigsberg and other cities, lastly at War- saw. During this era the poet, who from his youth had led a dissipated life, was married and divorced three times. During the years 1801-04 he lived at Konigsberg in order to take care of his mother, who had lost her mind ; she died on 24 February, 1804, and on the same day his friend INInioch also died at War- saw. This day of double sorrow provided him with the title of his best known tragedy, "Der 24.Februar". The next year Werner was transferred to Berlin as a confidential clerk. While there he devoted himself entirely to poetry. In 1807 he began a period of wandering, finally going to Rome, where he "re- nounced his erroneous beliefs" and was received into the Church (19 April, 1810). After this event his life flowed somewhat more smoothly. He studied the- ology and was ordained priest in the seminary of Aschaffenburg on 14 June, 1814. In August of the same year he went to Vienna, where the historic con- gress was then assembled. 'The peculiarities both of his personality and of his sermons attracted great attention. From 1816 to 1817 he hved with a Polish count in Podolia, then returned to Vienna and lived in the hou.se of the archbishop. Count von Hohen- warth. In 1821 he entered the novitiate of the Re- demptorists, but soon left it, owing to failing health. He was able to preach, however, a fortnight before his death.
Werner undoubtedly possessed great dramatic talent, but he lacked self-control, and produced no work of lasting merit. The most important, besides the tragedy already mentioned, are: "Vermischte Gedichte" (1789), "Die Sohne des Tales" (1803), "Das Kreuz an der Ostsee" (1806). To counter- balance the effect of his "Martin Luther" (1807), he wrote, after his conversion, "Die Weihe der Unkraft " (1814). During this latter period of his life, also, he wrote "Die Mutter der Makkabaer", a tragedy in which a beautiful tribute is paid to his mother in the principal character. His sermons were not published until 1840.
ScHUTZ. Biographic u. Charakteristik nebsl OriginalmilteilunO aus Werners Tagsbuehern. in the Collected Works of Weryier. XIV. XV; Rosenthal. Konrrrtilenbilder; Dt:NT2ER. Zrrei Bekehrte — Zacharias Werner und Sophie ron Schardt. 187S; Minor, Schick- sat-^tragodie in ihren Hauptrertretern (1883): Innerkofler, Eiri daterreichiscber Reformator, der hi. Klemens Hofbauer (1910), gives an account of Werner's labours at Vienna.
N. SCHEID.
Werner, Karl. See Austro-Hungarian Mon- archy.
Wesdin, Philip. See Paulinus a S. Hartholo-
